Day One Hundred and Seventy Four - 54th Blog Post

It's been a while. Not a lot has happened but what has happened has been immense. My friend went into hospital last Tuesday week and had part of her kidney removed. The surgeon said it was a large tumour. She is awaiting the pathology on it currently. Unbelievably they sent her home on the Thursday. I think that's par for the course at the moment because of COVID-19. That was a week ago. She had to quarantine for a week after the surgery. Her quarantine ended today. To celebrate she wanted to go to the seafront and maybe have an ice cream. The local area has a renowned ice cream maker called Rossi. One of the most beautiful ice creams you'll ever taste. She drove past my house on the way. I thought it would just be a wave from the car but she got out. And we both burst into tears! I believe the young people would call it "totes emosh". She looked well but she was moving slowly and carefully. There is still a long way to go. You don't just get up from cancer surgery and behave as if nothing's happened. She will try and do that if I know her but I think her body will tell her no.

I haven't done my full walk now since last Thursday week. I've been unwell. I tried to ignore it but in the end it flattened me. To cut a long story short I ended up phoning the surgery on Monday. I was incredibly anxious because I feared them requiring me to attend an appointment. And I didn't know how I was going to get there. I really was feeling quite unwell. I didn't want to get a taxi. And I wasn't sure if I was well enough to walk it. But again because of COVID-19 they try to avoid having people attending so I had a telephone consultation with one of the practice nurses. Based on what I told her she concluded that I was suffering from viral tonsillitis. Previously had got myself into a panic thinking that I had contracted coronavirus. It was an overreaction, I'll admit. I have no temperature, no cough, fully retained my sense of taste and smell. And nowhere online, I looked and my sister looked, could we find any evidence that a swollen tonsil featured in any coronavirus presentation. Then I googled it and panicked that I was suffering from throat cancer. Particularly as this is the second time the tonsil has swollen. The first time it went down again in a couple of days and without me feeling that ill. Today is the first day that I felt anything like okay but it's affecting my ears as is often the case and I'm a little bit dizzy. However I was determined to get out. Get some fresh air and get my body moving again. So I didn't do a full walk but I did go up to see the sea and walked part of my route.

I just want to get better and get back to "normal". My friend's daughter returns to Portugal on Monday and she's going to be bereft. I want to be on hand in case she needs any support. I'm not sure if her partner will return to work or whether he will continue to work from home. But whatever the situation I think she's going to need someone close by.